Lesson 10.2 Absolute dating - potassium-40 has a half-life of 1.

3 billion years and

-any method of measuring the age of an event or
object in years
-to determine the absolute ages of fossils and
rocks, scientists analyze isotope of radioactive elements
● Isotopes
- are atoms of the same element that have the
same number of protons but different numbers of
neutrons
- most isotopes are stable, meaning that they stay
in their original form. Other isotopes are unstable and
they are called radioactive
● Radioactive isotopes tend to break down into
stable isotopes of the same or other elements. In
radioactive decay, an unstable radioactive isotope of
one element breaks into stable isotope. The unstable
radioactive isotope is called the parent isotope
whereas; the stable isotope produced b the radioactive
decay of the parent isotope called the daughter isotope
it decays leaving a daughter material of Argon. This
method is used mainly to date rocks older than 100,000
years
2. Uranium-Lead method
- uranium-238 is a radiactive isotope with a half-life
of 4.5 billion years. Unranium-238 decays series of steps
to lead-206. The uranium-lead method can be used to
date rocks more than 10 million years old
3. Rubidium-Strontium method
- the unstable parent isotope rubidium-87 forms a
stable daughter isotope strontium-87. The half-life of
rubidium-87 is 49 billion years. This method is used for
rocks older than 10 million years
4. Carbon-14 method
- carbon is normally found in three forms. The
stable isotope carbon-12 and carbon-13, and the
radioactive isotope carbon-14. The half-life of carbon is
5730 years. The carbon-14 method of radiometric is
used mainly for dating things that lived within the last
50,000 years

Reporter: Marmaya, Hasmidah A.

● Radiometric dating

-is achieved by determining the absolute age of a

sample based on the ratio of parent material to
daughter material

● Half-life

- is the time needed for half of a sample of a

radioactive substance to undergo radioactive decay.
After every half-life, the amount of parent material
decreases by one-half

■ 4 radiometric-dating methods based on the

estimated age of an object

1. Potassium-Argon method